How should we judge the debate?

a) Judge a speech by your standards

b) Judge a speech by the best standards known

c) Judge a speech relative to the opponents speech

I'm really stumped on this one guys. So how should I judge a speech? Does it matter which one method I use, or is there a preferred way?

There’s a lot of nuance to it.

The most important aspect is that whatever you think or believe should not have any bearing on the way you vote. Facts, information that you know but aren’t discussed can’t figure in. Arguments that you have in your head that you think would win the debate is irrelevant. The debaters are debating against each other - not you: so you should bear that in mind, you are always comparing the two debaters and points together.

So in this case C.) is the only way of judging.

However, there are a huge variety of different ways you can do that. And basically there has been major arguments in S&D about the best ways of doing that.

As a voter you must consider who has burden of proof on each individual claims, whether the debates has provided a sufficient warrant (justification or evidence). 

An argument is often a tug off war; a justified issue pulls the way towards on individual. A good rebuttal that casts substantial doubt on the point pulls it back. Well evidenced and justified arguments pull harder than a logical opinion.

Most of the different styles of judging boil down to how you these different aspects are measured.

A and B are of course wrong, it's C, like Ram. said.

I believe in A. Usually A will include B and C... Don't see the contradiction.

Judging by your own standard, of the perfect standard often leads to a scenario where you judge the debates against how you feel one side should have argued. Not only could you be wrong about how he should have argued (as it’s often personal preference), but as your judging each side by your own opinion, the standard is different for both sides, and thus is often inherently unfair.

You're doing that no matter what...

Ramshutu, you have plenty-a-time voted against me saying I should have argued X or Y instead and solely based your vote on disliking the path I chose.

I don’t judge arguments people don’t make; I do sometimes point out that arguing some side tangent instead of the main argument isn’t relevant to the resolution, or point out that sacrificing a topical argument for an absurd semantic Kritik harmed your defense : but this is mostly for the purposes of offering some constructive help on how to improve.

Oh yes, that's why in that debate I had on gay rights parades, you voted me down for not debating the way you liked it even though I won it. 

That's why in the debating where I annihilated my opponent and they conceded, you gave it a tie sayingi gish gallopd.

That's why you voted against me on the debate I had against generalgrant on abortion you refused to admit I won because I didn't use the exact legislation or method that you wanted.

That's why every vote, whether for or against me, you refuse to compare my and the opponent's argumens to each other but instead to your 'aboslute standard of what should have been argued and how' and then pretend to do C sometimes just to blend in.

not to mention the debate I had against MAR in the early days where I turned his trap against him and no one respected it. The person who voted for me didn't even understand how well I had turned the trap on him.

All of those debates and all of those votes compare your debates and arguments against the others, and meant that you lost; for a large plethora of reasons - most commonly irrelevant arguments that are unrelated to the resolution, lacking warrant, or simply ignoring major parts of your opponents argument. Suggestions otherwise are really just fabrications from someone who does not seem able to take any criticism of any kind from anyone. If you recall we had a debate on this specific topic and you were crushed hard. I would happily have another.

 

Method A at work. It's okay though, all human use method A, we cannot escape our own judgement.

RM when he says Method A he's not saying to the best of your ability.

Here are better explanations:

A: Judge arguments based on whether you think they are correct.

B: Judge arguments based on what most respected people believe are correct

C: Judge arguments based on what the debate has determined to be correct

Also note that logic is not an argument; logic is universal, but claims and explanations as to why those claims matter ARE arguments.

And it is possible to have debates about logic, like the nature of it, or about math.

But you can't necessarily debate the logic.

Maybe you kind of could, but you would essentially be explaining why your opponent thinks that, idk, things that are not true are intrinsically, therefore true, and probably will have to argue against them about the nature of logic.

To win, you ought not simply state anything that is not true is not true and therefore not true, you would have to refute you're opponent's arguments that something that is not true is true as well.

And the opponent's view would deal with the nature of logic.

So what matters is what the debate has determined to be right. Not what you think is right.

You can't vote on a debate for the guy who forfeited everything just because you think their opponent was dumb.

The guy never refuted anything!

That's all DynamicSquid's question was asking, RM, not if you should judge to the best of your ability or not.

And Ramshutu explains it well, too.

ramshutu's actions have flown in the face of that philosophy many times, but sure he can speak about it well.

Yeah I don't like Ramshutu that much at times, he kind say things well, but him and therealnihilist (therealnihilist I know is like this, not necessarily for ram though) sound like they don't do philosophy good.

My votes all follow that philosophy.

oh rationalmadman was talking about that philosophy, not philosophy in general. I wouldn't know because I don't read your votes.

Bsh made a really guide in-depth voter guide https://www.debateart.com/forum/topics/1790/in-depth-voting-guide